‘The Eidolon Splits’

Ever since the invention of fictitious worlds, we have wondered how drowning in these alternative worlds would impact our own mental state and health.

When we question the impact of the moving image or computer games, we repeat the same discussion that we have been held in relation to fictional stories in antiquity. With ever more powerful and multisensory virtual reality devices that allow for full-body immersion into a simulated environment, this question is brought to another level:

How do representations of the body in the virtual affect our mind and the understanding of our own bodies? In ‘The Eidolon Splits’ Austrian artist duo Depart inverts this question.

We follow the journey of the virtual character Randolf, who gets confronted with his counterpart from the real. 3D-scanning technology has opened a door for a non-fictional character to enter his virtual world.

 

A touchscreen invites us to interact with the characters’ virtual world, situated on a vast screen at the rear side of the exhibition hall. However, this interface, with its symbolic buttons and bars, is more of a promise than a real tool. It turns out to be a permeable membrane uselessly meandering between the touchscreen and the world on the screen. It passes through the characters’ bodies, questioning the boundaries between ‘the virtual’ and ‘the real’.

Similar to ourselves, Randolf enters a process of self-examination as an effect of being confronted with a golem-like clump of visualized data. We are allowed to listen to this reflection about his own body image and identity catalysed by the delimitation from his ‘real’ counterpart.

This work was commissioned by NODE and Native Instruments. Visit the project’s website by the artists.

Interview with the artists

“We work in a poetic tradition, our works are audio-visual poems.”

In their collaboration, Gregor Ladenhauf and Leonhard Lass regularly explore the interplay between word, sound and visual image. Their interactive installations dissolve the lines between the virtual and the non-virtual, fiction and what we call the real.

 

Aesthetics

Co-Commissioned with

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About the artists

Leonhard Lass

Vienna, Austria

depart.at

Leonhard Lass is a visual artist and the kaleidoscope eye of ‘Depart’, a twin-headed art group focusing on the sound-image-text ménage à trois. His work interweaves all media at hand into one fine Gordian impact. Peppered with contemporary magic it seeks to tame the incomprehensible by short-circuiting our cultural hypertext. He has gained some notoriety as a ruthless smuggler of audiovisual booty across the well guarded border between the poetic and the mundane.

Gregor Ladenhauf

Vienna, Autria

depart.at

Gregor Ladenhauf (AT) is a sound artist and the multifaceted ear of ‘Depart’, a twin-headed art group focusing on the sound-image-text ménage à trois. Their work interweaves all media at hand into one fine Gordian impact. Peppered with contemporary magic it seeks to tame the incomprehensible by short-circuiting our cultural hypertext. They have gained some notoriety as a ruthless smuggler of audiovisual booty across the well guarded border between the poetic and the mundane.